The invention relates to an injection-moulding machine with at least one handling device, with an electronic stored-program control (SPC) for the injection-moulding machine and an electronic stored-program control for the handling device.
Injection-moulding machines for manufacturing plastics articles usually have two mould halves relatively movable relative to each other. In the closed state, a viscous plastics material is injected via an injector unit. Following curing, the mould is opened and the finished plastics article removed. In order to remove this plastics article from the region of the opened mould halves in order to prepare the injection-moulding machine for the next cycle, handling devices, for example in the form of robots, are used which are capable of removing the plastics articles and transferring them for example onto a conveyor. Simpler handling devices are however also perfectly conceivable and possible.
It is already state of the art to control both the injection-moulding machine and the handling device each via a separate electronic stored-program control, i.e. two computers would be present, one for the injection-moulding machine and one for the handling device, on each of which the stored-program control has been implemented. An example of such a control is the applicant's control which has been sold for years under the name “ENGEL CC100”.